thank you netgalley for the e-arc. i thought this would be one thing when i started and it turned into something completely different but maybe for the best. i really enjoyed the story and the changing settings. i did not like the switching between first and third person a lot.

Dara is raised with privilege. She has connections in Washington DC that helped her get her job. She lives, rent free, in her grandmother’s apartment since the grandmother no longer lives in DC. Dara meets and quickly falls in love with Austin, an architect from London who is working in New York City. The book begins at dinner at her parents’ home. Dara and Austin are surrounded by their friends and her family. The wedding isn’t far off. The next week, back in New York, Austin is given news that will change the trajectory of their lives. Dara responds to the news by giving back the ring and running home. Then she runs to California to visit college friends. She seems to be trying to make huge changes in her life. There are several intertwined stories going on in the book. While I admire Austin for how he finally deals with adversity, Dara annoyed me in some places. But that makes the story interesting.

I’m sorry. I wanted to like this story but I really couldn’t t get into it . The writing was sporadic and confusing. I had trouble figuring out what was going on. It took so much effort that l found I was not enjoying reading the book so I did not finish it..
I’d never read this author before but I likely will not try her again.
Thank you to Net Galley for allowing me to read this book. The opinions are entirely my own.

This book was really difficult for me to get into, and I didn’t really connect with the writing style. It flips back and forth between first and third person narration and comes from many different points of view, which can make it harder to follow. I did, however, get really sucked in to the story and in the end I couldn’t put it down. Some very intriguing twists and turns to this one. I’d just recommend sticking with it until the story grabs you, even if the first part feels like a bit of a struggle.

A Great Marriage
A Novel
By Frances Mayes ( this review is from an ARC sent to me by Netgalley)
Dara Willcox, up in New York for a weekend, meets Austin Clarke at an art gallery. If love at first sight can happen, it happens to them.
However, days after their engagement Austin hears news that causes Dara to cancel the wedding and she refuses to reveal the reason to her parents and best friends.
While Dara escapes to California and Indigo Island, South Carolina, Austin, back in London, faces a major tragedy, the consequences of which are life-altering.
The author weaves the plot with the challenges of modern love empathy and acceptance as well as forgiveness.
Frances Mayes is the author of the modern classic Under the Tuscan Sun, which was a New York Times bestseller for more than two and a half years and inspired the beloved motion picture starring Diane Lane. It was followed by Bella Tuscany, Every Day in Tuscany, and two illustrated books, In Tuscany and Bringing Tuscany Home. She is also the author of A Year in the World, See You in the Piazza, Always Italy, and A Place in the World: Finding the Meaning of Home. Her novels include Swan and Women in Sunlight. Her books have been translated into more than fifty languages.

Enjoyable and thoughtful, this book surprised me with how much I enjoyed it. The story held my attention, and the writing is engaging. Recommended!

Frances Mayes can create great characters that are engaging, empathetic, and coping with love. When a perfect wedding is called off just days before the big event, it sends two people—and their families—reeling, in this poignant novel. A Great Marriage uses a multi-generational approach to illustrate the challenges of marriage, celebrating those who manage to navigate them together.
This is a slow story about how circumstances in our lives can affect not only ourselves but our extended families and friends. The storyline focuses on relationships and how compromise serves as a valuable tool.
I enjoyed this story, I used it as a palate cleanser between a mystery and an epic fantasy and it was a perfect book at this time. I read it on the beach too! The characters are likable and the storyline is engaging. If you enjoyed books such as Under the Tuscan Sun by this same author or Abby Jimenez's Just for The Summer, you will like this story. This might not be your next read if you seek action adventure and an in-depth plot.

As a longtime fan of Frances Mayes, I looked forward to reading “A Perfect Marriage” via an ARC provided by NetGalley. The story follows Dara Wilcox and her fiancee Austin Clarke, whose wedding is called off due to a surprise happening in Austin’s former life in London. The book then explores how they both pick up the pieces, and figure out how to move forward with their lives.

Dara escapes to California to recoup with friends as Austin leaves for London. Meanwhile, Dara feels small in comparison to her accomplished parents and grandmother, who themselves have lived and loved within great marriages and privilege. I appreciated the multi-generational character depictions here: with multiple points of view, we get the sense of complex familial dynamics at work, even if the book carried low stakes. In comparison , Mayes previous novel “Women in Sunlight” pulls off its promise much more effectively.

Frances Mayes’ A Great Marriage starts off with short, punchy sentences and a stream-of-consciousness style that introduces a lot of characters quickly. This matches the hectic feeling of wedding planning, but it left me confused about what was happening at first.

Set in 1995, the story follows Austin and Dara, a couple with what seems like a fairytale romance. They’re planning a beautiful wedding, but Dara suddenly calls it off and breaks up with Austin. The people around her don’t understand why, but we, as readers, are shown the real reason. The book follows Dara and Austin separately as they deal with the breakup and major life events.

Overall, while the story was interesting, it just didn’t hold my attention. I didn’t feel a connection with the characters, and I found most of them fairly unlikeable. The dialogue also felt a bit stilted and unrealistic, which made it harder for me to get into the story.

I wanted to enjoy this book more than I did, but it just wasn’t for me. I hope others will enjoy it more.

A very sweet book full of interesting characters. It takes place in the U.S. and England. There are many many characters and Mayes finds ways to make meaningful connections between them.

A Great Marriage was a beautifully written story about two people in a painful and impossible situation. Dara and Austin have a strong relationship and a loving bond but are ripped apart when something unexpected and heartbreaking happens. Dara and Austin go on separately to figure out the path for their individual futures. While also hoping to somehow find their way back to each other.

The story is heartbreaking, thoughtful and written with a strong prose. I enjoyed it thoroughly and felt deeply the emotions the characters were facing. I felt like there were some tangents on Dara’s end that either didn’t add to the story or weren’t fleshed out enough to make a difference. Either way I enjoyed the journey Dara & Austin taken in their lives. Each of the characters is interesting and important to the plot. It’s a story with a great deal of pain but a strong focus on the beauty of life.

I also tried the audiobook for parts of this book and found it to be a wonderful production with multiple narrators.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for an advance copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are mine alone.

This book had great promise but gets bogged down with a large character count and clunky plots that make it feel longer than its 320 pages. From the first few pages, the reader gets introduced to characters without really understanding who they are or how they play into the main story. This continues through the book….even within the chapters we would get different points of view that weren’t necessary for the plot and at times, created holes that never get filled in. The dialogue was too formal at times and didn’t sound realistic. It was hard to feel any connection between the characters because there rarely was emotion in their dialogue. Dara was an unlikable FMC who flipped opinions at the drop of a hat and was hard to relate to. The main conflict of this story had promise, but we see our MCs handling it mostly on their own, leaving the reader uninvested in their story and how it resolves itself.

I hate giving such a negative review, but I really struggled through this book and had to be fair on this one. While this one didn’t work for me, others may better receive the author’s writing style so hopefully this can help any prospective reader decide if this book is for them.

**Thank you to NetGalley and Random House-Ballantine for the advanced copy of this book in exchange for my honest opinion. I appreciate the opportunity!**

For me, Mayes is a gem. I love her writing, how she creates images with words and phrases, how she uncovers the small moments and amplifies them in ways that are relatable. Somehow I always leave her books feeling more grounded, understood, and at peace. To read Mayes is to dive into the small moments, see them expand, and to study relationships, even ones that are complex or hard to understand. I really enjoyed A Great Marriage and appreciated the focus on the intersections of family relationships and generations, not just what makes a great marriage or a good one but what makes a strong person and a enduring connection.

*A Great Marriage* by Frances Mayes is a beautifully written exploration of love, commitment, and the complexities of long-term relationships. Mayes’ lyrical prose and deep emotional insight create a rich, heartfelt narrative. It's a moving and reflective story that celebrates the beauty and challenges of marriage.

This beautifully written book was about a couple who met, fell in love, planned a wedding, and called it off two day before it was to happen.
Dara, a southern belle poised for Law School, met Austin, a British architect in New York City at an art gallery and it was love at first sight. They make plans for a lavish wedding, but Dara calls it off two days before the big event, and will not give the reason. Austin heads back to London, while she heads to San Francisco to find support from her two friends who were supposed to be in the wedding party.
This is not a sob story, or a self-help book, but a book for the reader to ponder over and to examine the values of honesty, and forgiveness in a relationship. The author delves into love between a couple, and among a family, and the strength and support that each type of love provides. She also examines how choices affect a relationship, and ultimately, what makes a good marriage.
I like Frances Mayes writing and she has once again brought us a book which has deep meaning, within a contemporary background.
I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley and the publisher and the opinions expressed are my own.

I requested this book because I really enjoyed the movie Under the Tuscan Sun. I figured this would be similarly entertaining. I struggled to get into the book, often reading only 10 or 15 pages before I lost interest and put it down. Eventually, about half way through, I gave up. I just didn't connect with the characters.

“…The mess invades our experience at every moment. It is there and it must be allowed in….”

Dara and Austin seem to have the perfect relationship. But as they head into the home stretch before their wedding, Austin discovers that a past betrayal has turned into a disaster that results in their wedding getting canceled. Dara’s grandmother has written an enlightened book called A Great Marriage, but Dara fears there is no hope for her marriage to Austin. She flees to California to be with friends, then helms a renovation project in New Hampshire to find her footing, and gradually opens up to friends and family members about what has happened. Meanwhile Austin goes home to London to be with his father and sister who are very supportive of him in spite of his monumental mistake.

As with her wonderful Women in Sunlight (one of my all-time favorite novels) Frances Mayes’ newest novel, A Great Marriage is full of her gathered wisdom, with poetic language and a strong visual sense, and is a delight to read. A Great Marriage was one of those “can’t put it down” novels, as I was so involved in the characters and their fascinating interactions. The pervasive theme that life is a messy business and that even great marriages are fraught with some measures of pain along with the pleasure is reassuring, and a great message to readers of all ages. Highly recommended to lovers of literary fiction, and family stories.

“To find a form that accommodates the mess, that is the task of the artists now.”

3.5 stars rounded up

Dara is to be married to her London love, Austin, shortly after the opening scene of the novel. However, Austin receives shocking news which results in much turmoil. It took me some time to get into the rhythm of the author’s writing as there were multiple perspectives from many characters both major and minor and sometimes starting out in first person then switching to third in the next paragraph. There were a lot of characters to keep straight but it was interesting to get their viewpoints, once I adapted to the style. The story was interesting and I enjoyed the different settings. I didn’t really connect with any of the characters but overall the novel was a quick read.

Thank you to NetGalley, the author and Ballantine Books for the opportunity to read and review this digital ARC.

Nope I just couldn’t get into.
For starters I feel like book just jumped right to pivotal moments. But to me they weren’t the pivotal moments the author intended as I had read enough to care about the characters yet. And honestly I never got invested in anyone.
Overly romantic in some spots yet the author seems to think writing a romance is not good enough so she throws in sweeping villas, views, globe trotting families to cross over into literature instead of “romance.”
Was happy to see the last page, my feeling of being underwhelmed was then put out if it’s misery.

A Great Marriage by Frances Mayes starts at Dara and Austin's engagement party at her parents' home in April 1995 and ends in December 1995. The writing style was very hard to follow especially at the beginning. The narrative takes place inside the heads of multiple characters and the tense will change from 1st to 3rd and back again in a single paragraph. Sometimes there is a quote at the beginning at a chapter, but not always.

Descriptions are wordy and flowery which can be lovely but it take a long time to get anywhere. It's hard to meander through these relationships when it is clear what will happen and where they will all end up. It was also hard to like two pretty spoiled main characters like Dara and Austin. I did enjoy their friends, especially Mei and Luke, Courtney and Katie, Amit, and the crew at The Palms.

I did love the book cover and how it evokes Millais's iconic painting, Ophelia.

<spoiler>I didn't understand how an architect who was making a good salary in New York City moves to London to raise his child but without the £10,000 annual stipend from Shelley he'd be "living with his dad or in a cramped apartment." How was he affording NYC? Thank goodness for poor Shelley and her forethought. </spoiler>

Thank you to Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine and NetGalley for the advance reader copy. I am required by law to disclose this. #AGreatMarriage #NetGalley #RandomHouse